


The Soul Connection

by Lazaraz



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Dark, Dark Draco Malfoy, Dark Magic, Drama, Drama & Romance, F/M, Hogwarts, Hogwarts Era, Hogwarts Sixth Year, Mind Control, Minor Violence, Patronus, Psychological Drama, Romance, Swearing, Teen Angst, Teen Romance, Teenage Drama, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-29
Updated: 2017-03-21
Packaged: 2018-09-20 15:31:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,852
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9498446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lazaraz/pseuds/Lazaraz
Summary: Draco finds the Half-Blood Prince textbook and uses one of its mysterious spells on Hermione, which connects their souls and causes their thoughts and emotions to be permanently shared. Despite their differences, a love-hate relationship emerges as Hermione discovers Draco's depression and mission to kill Dumbledore and Draco realises that she is the only person he can trust. Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger pairing. Originally posted on fanfiction.net, so please forgive the lack of formatting. :)





	1. Chapter 1

**Prologue**

"No one can help me," said Malfoy. His whole body was shaking. "I can't do it ... I can't ... it won't work ... and unless I do it soon ... he says he'll kill me ..."

And Harry realised, with a shock so huge it seemed to root him to the spot, that Malfoy was crying - actually crying - tears streaming down his pale face into the grimy basin. Malfoy gasped and gulped and then, with a great shudder, looked up into the cracked mirror and saw Harry staring at him over his shoulder. Malfoy wheeled round, drawing his wand. Instinctively, Harry pulled out his own ...

"SECTUMSEMPRA!" bellowed Harry from the floor, waving his wand blindly.

Blood spurted from Malfoy's face and chest as though he had been slashed with an invisible sword. He staggered backwards and collapsed on to the waterlogged floor with a great splash, his wand falling from his limp right hand. Slipping and staggering, Harry got to his feet and plunged towards Malfoy, whose face was now shining scarlet, his white hands scrabbling at his blood-soaked chest ... he fell to his knees beside Malfoy, who was shaking uncontrollably in a pool of his own blood.

\----------

'I need a place to hide my book ... I need a place to hide my book ... I need a place to hide my book ...' Harry thought. Three times he walked up and down in front of the stretch of blank wall. When he opened his eyes, there it was at last: the door to the Room of Requirement. Harry wrenched it open, flung himself inside and slammed it shut.

\----------

Harry hurried forwards into one of the many alleyways between all this hidden treasure. He turned right past an enormous stuffed troll, ran on a short way, took a left at the broken Vanishing Cabinet in which Montague had got lost the previous year, finally pausing beside a large cupboard which seemed to have had acid thrown at its blistered surface. He opened one of the cupboard's creaking doors: it had already been used as a hiding place for something in a cage that had long-since died; is skeleton had five legs. He stuffed the Half-blood Prince's book behind the cage and slammed the door.

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**Chapter 1**

Hermione was absolutely sick of Draco Malfoy. It was ridiculous. Ever since her first year at Hogwarts, she'd never really liked him. He was arrogant, egotistical, proud, pureblood-obsessed, Slytherin, cowardly, snide, mean and hurtful. He had disgusting, greasy slicked back blonde hair, dull cold grey eyes, and pale skin. Everything about him frustrated and revolted her. To make it worse, he seemed to hate her just as much as she hated him simply because she was a muggle-born. Add prejudiced to the list of attributes. But to top it all off, he was also intelligent. Although Hermione was the smartest witch of their age, always beating him in every test and exam, he was usually second best. In Potions he was almost just as good as her, though she blamed this on Snape for favouring Slytherin's more than everyone else. But there it was, and everyone knew it: Draco Malfoy was not stupid, he was the smartest Slytherin student at Hogwarts. His idiotic cronies Crabbe and Goyle were stupid, but he was not. And this only frustrated Hermione further. Perhaps if he was just like his cronies, saying things that he didn't fully understand or mean... she would be able to ignore him, but he wasn't like that. When he called her a mudblood he knew that it would hurt her feelings and he did it purposefully for that reason. Which, if possible, made it hurt even more.

Hermione was thinking about all of this whilst sitting in the library alone. Studying Potions, to keep ahead of the rest of the class. Mostly to keep ahead of Harry and Malfoy. They were in their sixth year and this of course meant that Harry had the 'Half-Blood Prince' textbook. He'd been getting every potion perfect for weeks on end, but that all stopped after he used the spell on Malfoy in the bathroom. After that Harry promised he'd thrown the book away, and his grades in potions deteriorated as proof of that. The fact that Malfoy was never far behind also frustrated Hermione though. Calling her a mudblood was one insult, but calling her stupid whenever he happened to beat her in a test... now that would get to her. That would get her where it hurt, right in her soft spot, and he knew this. The only things Hermione could pride herself in were her intelligence and her bravery. She wasn't pureblood and she didn't think she was beautiful. The only way she could insult Malfoy was by calling him an evil git, or insulting his inferior intelligence. Take away her intelligence and Malfoy would make her life hell. For some unknown reason it seemed like he was trying very hard to beat everyone that year. His behaviour was unusual. For one, his usually greased head of slick hair wasn't neat and tidy any more. It was ordinarily dry, blonde, ragged and untidy. He had black bags under his eyes, which meant that he wasn't sleeping much. Hermione feared that this meant he was studying more than her, which in turn caused her to study more as well. Hence the reason she was in the library right now, thinking of this and determinedly re-reading her Potions textbook.

But back to Malfoy. He wasn't hanging around with his cronies much any more either. Harry was suspicious that he was a Death Eater, which Hermione thought was ridiculous. Harry also suspected that he was up to something bad, but all of Harry's warnings were dismissed by her. Hermione had to admit though, Malfoy's behaviour was strange. Why did he look so exhausted, sometimes even worried, all of the time? Why was he overly offensive to everyone around him? He'd always been snide and rude. Now he was different though. He was much more serious. If he wanted to insult someone he didn't sneer, he looked ready to kill and he made sure that it sounded horrible. This meant that his blood-related insults had also stepped up a notch.

Who was that? Hermione had glimpsed a flash of blonde hair. She lowered her book sharply and looked up to see Draco Malfoy himself slipping past an isle in the library. His cold grey eyes were alert and moving quickly as he skimmed across the books, desperately searching for something. Hermione snorted, feeling smug. He was trying really hard to beat her in exams, it was almost sad from her point of view. He'd heard the snort and seen the smug expression.

"What are you looking at, mudblood?" came his insult, with just the right amount of hate in his words to make her cringe.

"A pathetic excuse for a wizard. I'd appreciate it if you left my library," replied Hermione in a bored voice, returning to her book as if what he'd said didn't matter to her. After six years, she was becoming an excellent actor. But after six years, the prejudiced insults somehow never failed to hurt.

"You're a mudblood, that makes you pretty much the definition of pathetic. It's not my problem that you hide here because you haven't got any friends," Malfoy continued, glaring at her from where he was searching the wall of books. Hermione slammed her book down on the table.

"I'm not hiding here, I just like the peace and quiet which you're ruining right now. Plus I have more friends than you," she hissed angrily.

"Whatever, everyone knows the library is your sanctuary," snapped Malfoy indifferently. He pulled a thick book off of a shelf, opened it and began reading it rapidly. Hermione felt herself blush.

"So what if it is? Just leave me alone," she said firmly, hiding her face behind her book again. She assumed he'd found his book a few moments later, as he let out a very quiet sigh of relief. She didn't bother looking up to see though, and instead tried to concentrate on reading.

"I wonder how many times you've read that textbook, yet you still barely beat me," Malfoy sniggered as he walked past her.

"Go away!" Hermione growled, feeling herself go red with anger. When he'd finally left the library, with an air of superiority and 'I'm-better-than-everyone', she slammed her book down on the table again. He was right. Potions was a practical subject, it didn't matter how many times she read this damn book, it wouldn't improve her skill. Potion-making was, after all, a skill. Books could only help so much. To make matters worse, he was right and he knew it. She stuffed the book into her bag and heaved it onto her back, planning to leave the library as well. Before she left however, she walked over to where he'd gotten his book from. She knew the library back to front, and this isle contained books on magical objects and artefacts. Hermione skimmed along the row of books, in the same area he'd been looking, and saw the missing spot where he'd taken his book from. She was sure that it was called 'Fixing Broken or Damaged Magical Objects'. Why on earth would he need a book like that?

\----------

Finally he found a book that could possibly help. He wasn't sure if it would have anything to do with Vanishing Cabinets though... they were, after all, dark objects. He'd probably need to steal a book from the Restricted Section if he was going to get some useful information on the subject. He didn't have much time to fix the blasted thing either. His life, and the life of his parents, lay heavily on his shoulders. He had to succeed in killing Albus Dumbledore, not because he wanted to, but because Voldemort had ordered him to. Dumbledore was one of the greatest wizards in history and knowing that it was Draco's responsibility to murder his own Headmaster, well, you can imagine the kind of pressure he was feeling. As these thoughts swirled around in Draco's mind, he continued walking swiftly towards the Room of Requirement. He smirked as he realised that while Granger's sanctuary was the library, his was the Room of Requirement. It wasn't his sanctuary by choice however, he simply had to spend excessive hours inside slaving over the broken cabinet and scheming new ways to kill Dumbledore.

Why was he trying to fix the cabinet? There are two Vanishing Cabinets, one in the Room of Requirement in Hogwarts, and one in the dark wizard shop, Borgin and Burkes. When they're both working a passageway is created between the two. The cabinet in the Room of Requirement is broken, while the one at Borgin and Burkes still works. Thus if Draco failed to kill Dumbledore alone, he could fix the broken cabinet which would open the passageway and allow Death Eaters to enter Hogwarts without anybody noticing. It was a genius plan, but so far he'd had no luck whatsoever in fixing the cabinet.

As he walked, Draco remembered his mother before he'd gotten on the train for his sixth year which felt like ages ago, and how she was openly crying as she held him. It was obvious that she thought he would fail, she was crying because she thought she'd never see him again. Thanks for the confidence boost, mother, Draco thought to himself bitterly as he arrived on the seventh floor. He walked past the wall where the Room of Requirement was hidden, thinking over and over, I need to enter the place where all things are hidden. The wall morphed into a door, which he pushed open and closed behind himself. Inside lay mountains of junk objects that had been hidden by Hogwarts students over the years. He followed a path through the rubbish into the centre of the giant room, to where his cabinet was standing with a dusty old white cover on it. He tore off the cover and stared in loathing at the great wooden thing that had already consumed so much of his thought and time, before sitting on the ground and opening the book, 'Fixing Broken or Damaged Magical Objects.'

Within just five minutes of trying to read it, he slammed it closed. It was pointless, he had absolutely no idea what to look for. Plus he could barely even concentrate on reading, his mind was a mess. In a sudden flash of anger he threw the book at an old cupboard near the broken cabinet, causing it to make a loud thud! sound as it landed on the floor. As he calmed down, he came to the realisation that he would need Borgin's help to fix it. The sly man couldn't be trusted that was for sure, but he was the most knowledgeable person when it came to dark magical objects and he knew more about the Cabinets than anyone else in the wizarding world. Draco sighed as he stood up, deciding to get the book he'd thrown and go to the Owlery. He walked through the piles of junk towards the dusty cupboard, kicking things out of his way impatiently, until he bent over and picked the book up. As he stood, he noticed the cupboard had doors which were closed, and he opened them curiously. Inside was a strange cage with a skeleton inside, and behind that, a book. Draco raised an eyebrow as he reached in and removed the dusty volume, reading the front cover aloud, "Advanced Potion-Making?"

He inspected it further and turned it over, wondering why on earth another student would hide their sixth year Potions textbook inside a cupboard in the middle of the Room of Requirement, and saw an untidy scrawl along the bottom of the back cover of the book, 'This Book is the Property of the Half-Blood Prince.' He shoved both books into his bag, deciding to investigate it further in the hopes that it would have something his own textbook didn't. After all, attempting to beat Granger in Potions and watching her turn into an emotional wreck was about the most entertainment he had, given the circumstances. He headed for the Owlery, thinking about what he'd write to Borgin and considering sending a letter to his mother, who had been worried sick all year about what he was trying to do.

\----------

Later that day Hermione checked her watch and realised that it was nearly dinner time, and she picked up the pace slightly as she leapt up the stairs towards the Owlery. She wondered if it was childish to still be sending weekly letters to her parents as she had been doing ever since her first year. But given the circumstances and the return of Voldemort, she thought it was necessary to keep her parents up to date on everything. By the time she arrived at the top floor of Hogwart's West Tower where the Owlery was located, she was completely out of breath and red in the cheeks.

"Are you trying to get on my nerves, mudblood?" came Malfoy's arrogant remark, causing her to jump in fright.

"Gosh, what the hell are you doing up here!" snapped Hermione, as she turned and saw the Slytherin sitting beside one of the open windows with two letters in his lap, and his quill in hand.

"Sending letters to my magical relatives, you know, because they communicate by owl, which is what magical folk do," Malfoy drawled, knowing it would annoy her.

"My relatives know how to communicate by owl," said Hermione, gritting her teeth in frustration.

"Whatever mudblood. Do you mind? I'm trying to write."

"You should have written them somewhere else then, like I don't know, maybe in the library?" said Hermione sarcastically.

"Bookworms and losers write in the library, mudblood. I'd rather not taint my reputation and lower myself to your level," Malfoy answered as he scribbled on one of the parchments in his lap. The other parchment fell to the ground and was suddenly taken by the wind and flown out the open window right beside his blonde head. Hermione burst out laughing at his shocked expression, as he scrambled to his feet and struggled to pull his wand out. He glared at her, his expression like venom before he pointed his wand out the window at the drifting parchment.

"Shut up mudblood! Wingardium leviosah! Wingardium leviosah! FUCK!" Malfoy swore on the top of his lungs, putting his foot against the window sill and leaning out of it to get better aim. A gust of wind came but he easily held onto the window frame with his other hand. Hermione realised that whatever was on the parchment must have been important, and personal, because the boy looked genuinely panicked. She sighed and pulled her wand out, moving towards the window.

"Move, I'll get it."

"Now's not the time for your pretentious shit, mudblood," Malfoy growled.

"Stop calling me a mudblood, I'm not being pretentious! I'm trying to help you even though you don't deserve it!" said Hermione angrily. Malfoy looked back at her from where he was leaning out of the window in surprise, and looked back at the parchment which was floating more and more towards the ground. He moved out of the way, glaring at her.

"Fine. Don't you dare miss it or you'll wish you never tried to help," he hissed as Hermione gingerly stepped onto the window sill where he had been and leaned out to see where the parchment was. She pointed her wand at the parchment and held on, but felt her stomach doing somersaults at how high up she was. Beyond the parchment, she had a birds-eye view of many Hogwarts buildings, the courtyard, and off into the distance, vast green hills. The air was chilly and not far above her head were clouds. She'd always had an irrational fear of heights.

"Wingardium leviosa!" she said, with perfect pronunciation and flick of the wrist despite her nervousness. The parchment was caught by the spell and she began to pull it up with ease, and Malfoy put his head under her arm to watch. As he did so, another gust of wind came and Hermione felt herself lose her balance, being too concentrated on holding the spell to keep the parchment rising. Her foot slipped slightly and before she could even scream, strong hands had grabbed her hips roughly and held her still.

"Oh god!"

"Merlin mudblood, you might have brains but you don't have coordination," said Malfoy in amusement.

"Just be quiet and don't let me fall," Hermione stammered, as the parchment slowly but surely rose to them. Within a few moments of being uncomfortably close, the parchment finally reached them and Hermione grabbed it with her wand hand. Her entire body was shaking from adrenaline, and she didn't dare move as the wind kept threatening to throw her out.

"Step down and give me the parchment."

"I can't," Hermione said shakily, and Malfoy rolled his eyes as he lifted her off the window sill and dropped her safely on the floor of the Owlery, before snatching the parchment out of her hand.

"You owe me for saving your life, and don't tell anyone what just happened," Malfoy said nonchalantly as he sat back down where he was, smirking as he watched the shaking Gryffindor girl take deep breaths with her eyes closed to calm down. Within moments she opened them and glared at him.

"You owe me for risking my life to save your stupid letter, you inconsiderate prick!" came her furious retort. In different circumstances Malfoy would have laughed at how angry she was, but he had to defend his ego.

"I don't care mudblood. No matter how many good little deeds you do, I still won't care. Send your letter and leave me alone," he said, looking into her eyes coldly. She shook her head in fury and walked over to where Harry's snowy owl was and began tying a written letter to its leg.

"I hate you, it's no wonder you're hiding up here to write your letters, you're not wanted anywhere else," said Hermione with as much contempt as she could muster, after she'd sent Hedwig out of the window.

"Says the muggle-born who is unwanted by the entire wizarding world, did I mention I don't fucking care what you or anyone else thinks? Go have dinner with your idiot friends," Malfoy snapped back angrily.

"At least I have friends," were Hermione's last words before she left him alone in the Owlery.

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Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please feel free to review and add to alerts/favourites! :)

**Check out my other stories!**

Draco and Hermione - www.fanfiction.net/s/5661111/1/Draco-and-Hermione

The Soul Connection - www.fanfiction.net/s/9868543/1/The-Soul-Connection

The Time-Turner Division - www.fanfiction.net/s/12337018/1/The-Time-Turner-Division


	2. Chapter 2

"Where are you going?" Pansy demanded, as Draco walked as fast as he could away from the Slytherin common room. He was going to the Room of Requirement, where he could have the meltdown which was inevitably boiling to the surface in private. Never again would he be caught in tears in front of another person, not after Potter found him and used the Sectumsempra curse on him in the toilets.

"To the toilets, I'll be back later," Draco replied without even a glance back.

"Fine, I'll come with you."

"Just wait in the common room," he snapped.

"Tell me what's going on, Draco. Look at me!" Pansy said, raising her voice. There was an uncomfortably long silence as he turned around and made eye contact with the raven-haired girl, and the pain of rejection was clearly visible in her emerald green eyes as Draco shook his head and moved to keep walking. The next words were like a needle in his heart.

"Do you not like me any more?"

"It's not that Pansy."

"Then what is it!"

"You know what it is!" Draco shouted, "I have to do something for You-Know-Who or else... or he'll... look I can't tell you!"

"You have to tell me, everyone has noticed you've been avoiding us and acting weird. I can help you, just tell me what you need," pleaded Pansy as she moved closer to him. Each step she took towards him, he took a step backwards.

"I have to do it alone. If I fail I might as well be dead. Just stay away from me Pansy, it's for your own good," Draco said sadly as he left her standing there and took off again up a flight of stairs towards the Room of Requirement. He didn't often feel guilt, he wasn't the kind of person to care what other people thought. But Pansy was to Draco what Harry was to Hermione: a best friend, the closest friend he had in the miserable old castle. Guilt, as well as the multitude of other emotions, was eating away at him as he neared closer to the Room. Once he was inside, he grabbed the bag on his back and threw it as hard as he could across the large expanse of junk. Thankfully it went in the direction the broken cabinet was in, but Draco didn't really care. He proceeded to savagely kick a pile of books, push over an old bookshelf which broke and splintered on the ground, grab an old broom and break it on the broken bookshelf, and then punch a mirror, shattering it. He felt no pain, but the sight of crimson blood dripping from his hand snapped him out of his rage. He ignored it and stumbled over to where he'd thrown his bag, leaving a trail of blood behind himself, before falling down beside the bag. His mind was a whirl as he tried to concentrate on what to do next. Snape had come to him with a message from Voldemort, saying that if he didn't make progress with killing Dumbledore faster, his parents would be punished. When Voldemort says 'punished', it's not hard to imagine the severity and cruelty which awaited Narcissa and Lucius Malfoy. Snape had yet again offered his assistance to Draco, which Draco yet again refused. Voldemort had set Draco the mission to kill Dumbledore, no one else. If he let Snape do it, he wouldn't gain Voldemort's forgiveness, the Malfoy name would not be cleared, and his parents would still get punished. He was, quite literally, alone in the endeavour.

Well, he had Borgin. It'd been a few days since he sent the letter asking for help on fixing the cabinet, and he was still waiting for a reply. After reading the 'Fixing Broken or Damaged Magical Objects' book some more, he guessed that it would require a special kind of potion and a tricky Transfiguration spell in order to fix the cabinet. There were many different kinds of potions and spells involved in mending and restoring magical objects, and only Borgin would know which combination was required to fix a teleporting cabinet. As Draco pondered this he realised his hand was still bleeding, and sighed as he pulled out his wand and healed the wounds. He reached over to grab his bag and pulled out the Potions textbook he'd found the last time he was in the Room of Requirement, flicking through it again. He swore he'd seen spells in the margins, and sure enough, after a few minutes of reading the various helpful scribbles on each page, he found a page with spells on it. The first one, 'Levicorpus', apparently dangled the victim upside down by their ankles. Draco smirked as he read the description, and then his eyes widened in shock at the next spell. It read, 'Sectumsempra - for enemies'. He remembered it was the exact spell Potter had shouted in the toilets and only Snape knew how to heal the wound it caused. Draco continued flicking through the book feverishly to see what else it had hidden, seeing spells such as 'Liberacorpus' and 'Muffliato'.

On a page closer to the back of the book, the last spell was scrawled in tiny writing, 'Anima Nexu - for her'. This puzzled Draco, as it was written in a similar way to Sectumsempra, just saying 'for her' with no explanation. Was 'her' an enemy? Was Anima Nexu a less extreme version of Sectumsempra designed for a girl that this past student hated? Draco flicked back to the page with Sectumsempra, and came to the conclusion that Potter must have found this book. It would explain why he went so well in Potions and got the Felix Felicis potion off Slughorn, as the book had better instructions scrawled on every page. It would explain where he found Sectumsempra, and that perhaps he hadn't meant to cut Draco open... all the book said was 'for enemies', Potter couldn't have known what it would actually do. It would also explain why the book was hidden: Potter attempted to hide the evidence for what he did. Or the mudblood told him to get rid of it so she could continue being the best Potions student. Draco smirked as he realised that her winning streak was going to come to an abrupt end now that he had this textbook. As he put it away and saw the pool of blood where his hand had been dripping, and the still-broken cabinet, his thoughts of Potter and potions vanished. They were replaced with haunting mission he had to accomplish, and the familiar melancholia that he had become accustomed to.

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"What have we got next?"

"Potions."

"Ugh, kill me now," groaned Harry as he played with his lunch at the Gryffindor table.

"I thought you liked Potions now that Snape doesn't teach it?" asked Ron in surprise.

"He liked Potions when he had that Half-Blood Prince textbook because he was beating everyone, but now..." Hermione trailed off with a smug smile, causing Harry to roll his eyes in annoyance.

"I'm just sick of Slughorn constantly expecting me to go well, that's all," said Harry dismissively.

"At least you got the Felix Felicis," said Ron with a shrug, "have you decided what you're going to do with it?"

"Not yet. I'm going to save it, maybe use it to get that memory out of Slughorn that Dumbledore wanted," Harry explained, lowering his voice so that nobody else at the table could hear them. As they discussed Harry's meetings with Dumbledore which usually involved horcrux hunting and studying Voldemort's mysterious past, Hermione found herself looking across the Great Hall at the Slytherin table. Possibly for the first time in Hogwarts history, Malfoy was sitting by himself a few seats away from the rest of his House, with his face buried in a book which she couldn't see. As everyone got up to move off to class, the Gryffindor's followed the Slytherin's and Hermione realised that Draco was still reading the book, which she could have sworn was the Potions textbook. When they arrived in class and took their seats, Slughorn turned to them all with an amusingly relaxed, lopsided grin.

"Today we will be studying and brewing the Draught of Peace, a potion which is rather self explanatory, however I'll give ten points to anyone who can explain it!" said Slughorn, and his grin turned to an expression of surprise when not only Hermione's hand shot into the air, but also Draco's, with equal speed.

"Well well, I'll give you a chance Draco!" boomed the Potions Master.

"The Draught of Peace is an advanced potion which relieves anxiety and agitation, it's ingredients are powdered moonstone, syrup of hellebore, powdered porcupine quills and powdered unicorn horn. It should be a turquoise blue when finished and simmered before being drunk, is difficult to make and can have drastic consequences if made wrong, such as putting the drinker into a deep and possibly irreversible sleep."

Everyone in the room was surprised as even though they knew that Draco was second best to Hermione, he rarely answered questions in class. When he finished the long explanation in a bored voice which sounded as though it was straight out of the textbook, he looked directly at Hermione with a smirk which only meant one thing: he intended to beat her in making this particular potion. The message was all too clear, as Hermione glared back at him in anger and determination to not be outdone.

"Well done Draco! Perfect explanation, ten points to Slytherin! It feels good to be rewarding my own house for a change, rather than Gryffindor, no offence miss Granger! Now, where were we. Ah yes, Draught of Peace. The fact that it is so difficult to brew and so easy to ruin is rather ironic, given that it's purpose is to relieve anxiety, not create it..." Slughorn drawled on, and it was obvious that he'd had some Draught of Peace as he spoke and acted much more calm and relaxed than he usually did. When everyone commenced brewing, Hermione was too busy speedily preparing her ingredients to even listen to Harry as he spoke to her.

"Hermione!" he nearly shouted to get her attention, and when she finally looked up he lowered his voice, "Malfoy has my textbook."

"The Half-Blood Prince textbook?" Hermione whispered, and when he nodded she glanced over and saw that Draco was brewing his potion at a steady pace but preparing his ingredients in slightly different ways, just like Harry used to do, as he was following the scribbled instructions.

"It doesn't matter, there's nothing we can do," said Hermione with a shrug, although she was gritting her teeth in annoyance.

"But this means he's been in the Room of Requirement, just like I've been saying all year! He's up to something, and he probably knows about Sectumsempra," Harry continued quietly.

"We can't do anything about it, Harry! He found the textbook and he's been in the Room of Requirement, so what? Right now we just have to focus on studying and helping Dumbledore, Malfoy isn't important," said Hermione firmly. This seemed to calm and reassure Harry for the moment, as he nodded in understanding and went back to brewing his potion. The rest of the lesson was a gruelling torture for Hermione, as every time she looked up Harry and Ron were screwing their potions up and asking for advice while Draco's potion constantly looked a step ahead and better than her own. Every now and then they made eye contact and he would smirk in the most frustrating way imaginable, and the worst part was that they both knew that he had the upper hand with the Half-Blood Prince textbook.

"Time's up! Stop brewing," Slughorn announced with about five minutes left in the lesson. Hermione felt her heart begin to race as he moved between all of their desks to check their potions. He gave her potion an expectant nod of approval, nothing more. It was made exactly as the instructions said but not perfect like Draco's would be, Hermione knew. Sure enough, when Slughorn arrived at Draco's potion he clapped his hands in excitement.

"Oh wonderful! Perfectly brewed, maybe even better than my own, let's taste it," said Slughorn, as he took a spoon and had a small sip. He gave Draco a pat on the back and awarded twenty points to Slytherin, much to Hermione's dismay, before dismissing the class.

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Despite what she told Harry about ignoring the fact that Malfoy had found the Half-Blood Prince textbook, Hermione couldn't get the image of his smug look out of her mind. She wouldn't survive the year if she had to put up with him beating her in Potions, and she knew that he'd use that like a weapon to torment her with at every opportunity. Even though she had no idea how she was going to stop the Slytherin from using the textbook, Hermione had decided to go to the one place that Harry claimed Malfoy kept going, the Room of Requirement. She was fairly certain that Harry was right, since she'd seen with her own eyes Malfoy vanishing off the Marauder's Map on the seventh floor where the Room's entrance was, and since he managed to find the Half-Blood Prince Textbook, which was hidden in the most obscure spot in the Room possible. He obviously is up to something, if he's been going there all year, Hermione thought to herself as she climbed the last step onto the seventh floor. Before she could even catch her breath, a wand was pointed directly into her face.

"Following me, mudblood? Bit mad you're not as smart as you claim to be?" came Draco's infamous voice as he emerged into her peripheral vision. She turned to glare at him.

"You do know that's Harry's textbook."

"Oh I'm well aware, I found some peculiar spells in it last night," said Draco sarcastically.

"He didn't know what that spell did, the book doesn't even describe it!" said Hermione, defending Harry even though she knew it was his fault.

"I think the words, 'For enemies' gives a damn good hint as to what it does, do you take me for an idiot?" Draco snapped.

"No, you're not an idiot. But you are impulsive, mean, dangerous and revengeful and I don't want you having that textbook because you could use the spell on Harry," said Hermione, and Draco was laughing before she finished the sentence.

"You don't want me to have the textbook because I'll beat you in Potions for the next two years with it. It was nice chatting with you mudblood, but I'd kill my father before I gave you this textbook," said Draco with a smirk as he put his wand away and started to walk off. Hermione felt a sudden flash of anger rise within her as she pulled her wand out and pointed it at his back.

"I don't want to hurt you, but if you don't give me it I'll have no choice," said Hermione, with a surprising amount of force. Secretly she did want to hurt him, after all the years of name-calling and bullying, and she truly didn't trust him with the spells in that book. Draco stopped in his tracks and made no move for his wand at all, as if he was preparing for a duel.

"That's where we're different, mudblood, you said it yourself: I'm impulsive, mean, dangerous and revengeful. Remember when you punched me in our third year?" asked Draco calmly.

"You deserved-"

"Expelliarmus!" Draco hissed as he spun, drew his wand and cast the spell all at once with alarming speed. Hermione gasped as she watched her own wand fly from her feeble hand and into the Slytherin's in the blink of an eye.

"It," Hermione finished her sentence breathlessly.

"Don't worry, I won't punch you in the face, that's a bit too mean, don't you think? How about instead I do what Potter did to me. There's another spell in here that has no description, and I'm dying to see what it does," said Draco sarcastically, with an evil smile as he walked towards her, causing her to stumble backwards into the stone corridor wall.

"You wouldn't," said Hermione, her voice a mixture of defiance and nervousness. What if this other spell was like Sectumsempra? Surely he wouldn't risk gravely injuring her? He raised his wand and pointed it directly between her eyes.

"Anima Nexu," came the words. A golden mist seemed to emanate from the wand and fall around them, and Hermione felt a tingling sensation shoot through her, as well as a sudden headache. After a few moments of silent expectation, Draco sighed in disappointment.

"That was anticlimactic," he said.

"It gave me a headache!" said Hermione angrily, as she tried to snatch her wand back. Draco moved it out of her reach with a chuckle.

"Well I'm glad it wasn't a complete waste of time."

"Give me my wand back," Hermione demanded.

"Only if you promise that you won't follow me here again," said Draco, twirling her wand in front of her eyes teasingly.

"Fine, I won't follow you," Hermione promised quickly, with a glare.

"And you have to apologise for drawing your wand on me."

"Just give me my wand!"

"Apologise," Draco prompted, not budging. After a few moments of glaring into his dull grey eyes, Hermione took a deep breath.

"I'm so sorry Malfoy, please forgive me," she said, her voice filled with sarcasm. As Draco burst out laughing she snatched her wand off of him, muttering an angry 'jerk!' as she walked past him and headed back down the stairs. As she slowly walked away and heard his footsteps echo from the floor above, she knew that their rivalry had just reached new heights.

\----------

Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please feel free to review and add to your alerts/favourites! :)

**Check out my other stories!**

Draco and Hermione - www.fanfiction.net/s/5661111/1/Draco-and-Hermione

The Soul Connection - www.fanfiction.net/s/9868543/1/The-Soul-Connection

The Time-Turner Division - www.fanfiction.net/s/12337018/1/The-Time-Turner-Division


	3. Chapter 3

Hermione awoke the next day with the same headache she had from the spell Malfoy had cast on her. On top of that, she also felt a general sense of irritability. She couldn't tell whether it was irritability from the headache, from Malfoy in general, or from the spell. Regardless she tried to ignore the feeling and went about her day as usual, whilst plotting ways to get back at him. She figured that he must have been doing something in the Room of Requirement for a long time, to have found Harry's textbook. She planned on taking Harry's invisibility cloak and having a look in the Room of Requirement if she had time, and as long as Malfoy wasn't going to be there.

"I wonder what he's up to. He's got my textbook, he's been going to the Room of Requirement all year. He isn't talking to the other Slytherin's, not even Parkinson, which means he's hiding something even from the people he trusts," Harry was saying quietly as he played with his breakfast at the Gryffindor table. He and Ron were both staring across the Great Hall at Malfoy, who was sitting at the very end of the Slytherin table and not socialising with anyone at all.

"Harry, will you stop? Commentating his every move isn't helping things," Hermione snapped in annoyance.

"I'm not commentating his every move, I'm problem-solving," said Harry.

"That's not problem-solving, Harry. That's just stating facts," Hermione responded, taking a sip of her fruit juice.

"Alright then since you're so smart, what's the ferret up to?" Ron managed to ask through a mouthful of porridge.

After wrinkling her nose in disgust, Hermione responded, "The Room of Requirement is one of the best hiding places in Hogwarts, perhaps he isn't hiding something, maybe he's hiding himself, what with You-Know-Who returning and all."

"No. He's probably hiding something for You-Know-Who, not from him. I know he's up to something bad," said Harry darkly, his eyes not leaving Malfoy for a second.

"You can't just make a claim with no evidence, Harry! If you think he's up to something bad, give reasons," Hermione demanded. Ron, Neville and Seamus' listened on in fascination as Harry thought long and hard before speaking.

"He's a Malfoy, he's on You-Know-Who's side so he wouldn't be hiding from him. Even if he was, Snape could easily find him. He's old enough now to join the Death Eaters, and he hasn't been trying in any classes except Potions because he got my textbook, which means he doesn't have any need for school because he's becoming a Death Eater. If whatever he's hiding is important enough that he won't tell anyone, it has to be bad."

Hermione thought about it for a moment, and then shook her head. "None of that proves he's becoming a Death Eater or that it's bad, or even helps pinpoint what it is at all."

"Exactly, we don't have enough information to prove anything. That's why we need to investigate," said Harry in determination, getting a nod of eager agreement from Ron.

"Oh no, you are not going to investigate anything. You tried investigating on the Hogwarts Express and he broke your nose and left you paralysed there. You tried investigating in the bathrooms and ended up cursing him and nearly got yourself expelled," Hermione began heatedly, completely forgetting about her breakfast as she turned on him.

"If I'm right Hermione, I need to stop him from doing whatever it is that he's trying to do!" Harry hissed, his voice rising slightly.

"You need to focus your attention on what Dumbledore wants you to do, Harry. Dumbledore isn't stupid, if Malfoy's up to something I'm sure Dumbledore knows about it. If he hasn't mentioned it to you, I'm sure it's not a big deal, or he already has it under control," said Hermione, with a hint of irritation in her tone. Her headache was still bothering her, and the more she argued the more it seemed to hurt. She knew that her last sentence had won Harry over though, because he sighed in resignation and dipped his spoon into his porridge, looking away from Malfoy at last.

"I guess you're right. I'm going to ask him about it again, though," he said. Hermione shrugged in response, knowing that Dumbledore's answer would be the same as it'd been all year: don't worry about Malfoy, focus on Voldemort's horcruxes. While Hermione absolutely agreed with Dumbledore that Harry needed to focus on the bigger picture of defeating Voldemort and not worrying about some schoolyard bully, she did wonder what Malfoy was truly up to. A lot of what Harry said made sense and could even be true, she just didn't admit that because she didn't want him ending up in another duel. As breakfast ended Hermione looked across the Great Hall and watched as Pansy approached Malfoy tentatively and tried to speak to him, but he cut her short and left with surprising speed and apathy. As much as she hated Pansy, Hermione still felt a pang of sympathy as the Slytherin girl burst into tears. Hermione decided while walking to her first class that she would visit the Room of Requirement when she got the opportunity, with Harry's Invisibility cloak.

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"I'm not sitting next to you."

"Maybe if you weren't late you would've been able to sit with your friends. Oh wait, you don't have any," Hermione snapped, giving Malfoy a dismissive glare. He stood next to the empty seat beside her, the only empty seat left in the Charms classroom. Harry and Ron sat together like they always did, and so in every class with rows of two seats Hermione ended up by herself and sometimes nobody sat next to her. She supposed it was due to her unpopularity and tendency to zealously answer every question asked, but regardless, she'd gotten used to it. After a moments deliberation, Malfoy sat down so as to not draw attention to himself. Professor Flitwick had the classes attention, demonstrating what they would be learning that lesson by casting the Cheering Charm on Neville, who was smiling goofily at the front of the room.

"I don't have any friends? That's rich coming from the bookworm that nobody wanted to sit next to," Malfoy responded, his voice laced with menace. Hermione rolled her eyes, knowing that she wouldn't beat him in a contest of insults.

"At least I don't make my friends cry," she said, focusing her attention on Flitwick.

Malfoy scoffed, "And who have I made cry now?"

"Your girlfriend, are you blind?" said Hermione, turning to look at him. He raised an eyebrow and glanced across the room at Pansy, who surely enough had red eyes and looked as though she'd been crying.

"She's not my girlfriend, that lasted like a month in third year so you're a little behind on the gossip, mudblood," Malfoy said flatly, folding his arms and looking at the front.

"You don't feel bad?" Hermione asked, exasperated.

"Why should I feel bad? It's not my fault if someone else is crying," Malfoy responded.

"She cried because you said something to her in the Great Hall," said Hermione.

"All I said was, 'Don't talk to me', it's not my fault that she overreacted to something so harmless. Clearly you've been spying on me," Malfoy said in annoyance.

"I haven't been spying on you, everyone saw it. And that isn't a harmless thing to say, it's mean, especially to a friend," Hermione argued.

"I don't care, mudblood."

"How can you not care?"

"Because I just don't care. It's simple really. Now shut up."

Hermione felt an overwhelming surge of anger and opened her mouth to retort with a very vulgar two-worded statement starting with the letter 'F', but decided against it at the last moment. She refused to let him provoke her. Glaring at him felt like glaring at a brick wall, it was pointless because it accomplished nothing. He was still looking towards the front.

"You shut up," Hermione responded. She didn't care how childish it was, she needed to have the last word.

"You're just radiating with maturity, mudblood," Malfoy said sarcastically.

"Whatever."

The two of them sat there, not looking at each other, silently fuming. While Malfoy would usually smirk at shutting someone down with a witty comment, he just stared at the front with an air of annoyance. While Hermione would usually laugh at saying something so childish or at least find it somewhat amusing, and have something witty to retort with, she found herself at a loss for words and uncharacteristically irritable. Her headache was fading, but something else had taken its place. It was as if the physical pain of the headache was fading, but a different pain remained, a pain that wasn't physical or tangible. But it was there, and she felt it without knowing what it was. They realised that everyone else in the class had already began practising their Cheering Charms on each other, and there were a few laughs and giggles here and there. Hermione glanced at Malfoy, who gave her a look of utter dismissal.

"Come on, we need to practice the charm."

"No. I'll never use this stupid charm in real life, so I'm not practising it," snapped Malfoy.

"You put me in a shitty mood, the least you could do is try the damn spell," Hermione said with uncharacteristic anger.

"I couldn't care less what mood you're in, mudblood, did I not make that clear?" Malfoy mocked her, his arms still folded.

"Why the hell did you enrol in Charms then if you have no interest or motivation to actually study it?" Hermione demanded.

"It's none of your business mudblood, why do you care?" Malfoy growled. Hermione decided that she'd had enough of talking to him, he seemed to be infectiously negative, so she drew her wand and pointed it at him.

"Don't even think about it!"

"Vola beatudinem," Hermione pronounced the charm clearly and performed the spell perfectly. There was a brief pause, but absolutely no response from Malfoy.

"I will literally find you after class and hex you if you try it again," Malfoy growled, but Hermione ignored him. Rarely did her charms not work, she'd learnt this charm in their third year, and practiced it on Harry and Ron whenever they were feeling down. Her Cheering charms always worked.

"Vola beatudinem!" Hermione repeated with more emphasis. She felt a flash of annoyance flow through her. "What did you do? My charms always work, you've done something!"

"Evidently they don't always work, mudblood. You're kidding yourself if you think you'd ever be able to make me laugh," said Malfoy, with a reluctant smirk. She never thought she'd be pleased to see him smirk, but her eyes definitely brightened when she saw it and she opened her mouth to repeat the spell a third time.

"Don't-"

"Vola beatudinem!"

"I smirked because I insulted you not because of your shitty charm, you suck at charms," Malfoy spat, pulling his wand out as if to defend himself against her attempts to make him cheerful.

"I'm the best charms student in Hogwarts right now, literally, you know it, so why the hell is this charm not working? Harry and Ron are in uncontrollable hysterics if I do it just twice," Hermione said furiously. Her hand was almost shaking with anger. "You actually have no idea how annoyed I am, tell me what that spell did."

"Merlin mudblood calm the hell down," Draco snapped.

"I'm going to keep trying until you laugh," Hermione warned him.

"Alright I'll try the spell on you but only if you drop it," Malfoy snapped.

There was a pause as Hermione felt as if her entire body was oozing with anger, frustration and confusion. She knew that she was annoyed because her charm didn't work, and that was pretty normal because she was a perfectionist and hated not being able to perform a spell. But there was something else making her angry but she didn't know what it was, which only made it worse. She sighed and, wanting some sort of release, said: "Fine, do it on me, but if it doesn't work I'm going to figure out what you did."

"Vola beatudinem," Malfoy said, pronouncing it carefully. He watched as the Gryffindor girls frustrated expression relaxed slightly, and her eyes actually fluttered a bit. He felt a small tug of an emotion he hadn't felt in an incredibly long time: cheerfulness. That shocked him.

"Well, at least it works on me," said Hermione with a smile, clearly experiencing a complete shift in attitude. Malfoy stood up abruptly and grabbed his bag, causing her to raise her eyebrows in surprise. "Where are you going?"

He didn't answer and simply strode from the room as quickly as he could. A few heads turned to watch him leave, but most of the class were already too inebriated from the Cheering Charms to notice him. Hermione felt incredibly confused and considered following him for a moment, but decided against it. Even though she already knew how to cast Cheering Charms (despite the fact that they didn't work on Malfoy: something she vowed to investigate), class was more important to her than following some Slytherin. Yet she still couldn't help but wonder what was truly going on with him... she felt immensely confused, and she seemed to hear another voice ask in her mind: 'What on Earth just happened?'

\----------

'What on Earth just happened?' Draco thought to himself as he walked swiftly from the Charms classroom. He still felt tiny amounts of cheerfulness flowing through him, but it didn't feel right. It felt like it was coming from outside of him, from some foreign realm which his body felt uncomfortable with. Within moments he had returned to his usual melancholia, and he decided to head straight for the Owlery to see if Borgin had replied to his letter. As he walked throughout the halls of Hogwarts, every few minutes he would feel small tugs of cheerfulness, which would fade almost as soon as they had began. After he had arrived at the Owlery, he realised that the feelings stopped coming and he was left deeply intrigued as to what caused them. He knew that Hermione's Cheering Charms had little effect on him because nothing seemed to have any effect on him any more. He had grown used to the emptiness. He also knew that the happiness he felt happened the moment he cast the Cheering Charm on her... but why? Could Cheering Charms backfire? These questions swirled in his mind as he looked for his owl. At last he caught sight of it: a magnificent eagle owl, chocolate brown in colour, with deep, coal black eyes. While it's true that Draco had little love for House Elves and other creatures, he had secretly cherished this owl ever since his first year. It's name was Nox. He sighed with relief and satisfaction when he saw that it had a letter attached to its leg. Hopefully Borgin knew how to fix the Vanishing Cabinet and if so, Draco could finally make some progress on his mission.

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That Charms class was potentially the strangest Charms class Hermione had ever experienced. As she left the classroom early, giving the excuse of needing to help Professor McGonagall with something, she reflected on what had happened. First, her Cheering Charm didn't work on Draco, which had never happened before. His Cheering Charm worked on her, yet the moment she felt its effects he left, and then after he left the cheerfulness ebbed away unnaturally fast. She partnered up with a few other students and practiced with them: Harry, Ron, Parvati, Neville, Seamus. All of their charms worked on her, invoking cheerfulness but only for a very short period of time, after which she returned to feeling a strange, discomforting... emptiness. She also felt the same pain she experienced after Draco had cast the spell which gave her a headache. Ever since that odd spell she had felt different, slightly irritable and unhappy.

But that wasn't all. The thing that caused her to leave Charms early was something else altogether. She had a vivid, dreamlike image of an eagle owl clearly in her mind. She was almost certain that the owl was Draco's, yet as she hurried towards the Owlery she couldn't help but admit that it was a very beautiful owl. She felt a strange fondness for it even though she'd never paid any attention to it previously, apart from when it used to deliver chocolates and presents to him constantly in their first year. When she at last arrived at the Owlery she heard footsteps inside and the ruffle of feathers, and knew that Draco was there.

"Do you fancy me or something, mudblood? You seem awfully interested in everywhere I go," came his mocking voice when he saw her.

"What did you do?" Hermione demanded, ignoring what he said. He glanced at her, looking up from a piece of parchment that he was reading, and he seemed almost nervous.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Oh yes you do, ever since you used that spell on me everything has been different. My charms didn't work on you when they should have," Hermione began to say.

"If this is still about your bloody Cheering Charms: they work, just not on me, so drop it," said Draco in annoyance.

"Well they don't exactly work on me either any more, so I'm not dropping it! That spell obviously did something!" said Hermione, raising her voice.

"Let me guess, Weasley's shitty Cheering Charm didn't work on you? Look I really couldn't care less, I'm busy."

"I came here because I saw your owl as well, I literally saw it in my mind," Hermione blurted out. There was a silence before Draco responded.

"Perhaps you should see Pomfrey, hallucinations aren't exactly a good sign," he said mockingly, yet there was a degree of surprise in his expression which told Hermione that he was aware that something strange was happening between them too.

"I saw it in my mind because you saw it in real life," Hermione snapped angrily, glaring at him. She took a few steps towards him, and he took steps backwards wearily, "The Cheering Charm didn't work on you, and then it stopped working on me too. You found some sort of curse in Harry's Potions textbook and I'm not leaving until I see what it was."

"I haven't got the textbook on me. And I'm not giving you any more chances, mudblood. If you follow me again, you'll regret it," Draco growled as he rolled the parchment up and threw it in his bag. Hermione tensed slightly as he passed and gripped her wand in fury, glaring a hole into his back as he left the Owlery.

\----------

Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please feel free to review and add to your alerts/favourites! :)

**Check out my other stories!**

Draco and Hermione - www.fanfiction.net/s/5661111/1/Draco-and-Hermione

The Soul Connection - www.fanfiction.net/s/9868543/1/The-Soul-Connection

The Time-Turner Division - www.fanfiction.net/s/12337018/1/The-Time-Turner-Division


	4. Chapter 4

As the days went by, Hermione's mood continued to deteriorate. She'd had her fair share of bad days, yet she'd never felt as depressed as she'd been feeling lately, and never so suddenly. She was thoroughly convinced that Draco's spell was the reason for her misery. When she awoke on saturday morning, she slipped on Harry's Invisibility cloak that she'd taken the night before and left the Gryffindor tower. It was early enough in the morning that nobody else was awake and the sun was only just beginning to illuminate the castle walls. Hermione tip toed throughout the chilly castle until she arrived on the seventh floor, at the entrance to the Room of Requirement. She'd been waiting for an opportunity to sneak inside and investigate what Draco was up to, and when Harry and Ron left for Quidditch practice the night before, she took the Invisibility cloak. Given that Draco appeared tired all of the time, Hermione figured that he must be in the Room late at night, and so he ought to be asleep by dawn.

Once inside she was comforted by the eerie quiet. The Room seemed to be empty, despite being well lit. Hermione rarely went to the Room of Requirement and figured it must be magically illuminated at all hours. She began to walk towards the centre tentatively, her eyes scanning along the ground around her for anything new or out of place. It seemed hopeless though, as she had no idea what to look for and if Draco had hidden something, it would take days or even weeks to find by herself. Convinced that she was alone, Hermione pulled the Invisibility cloak off of herself and stretched her arms as she kept walking, yawning slightly. She suddenly saw something move out of the corner of her eye and before she could react, she heard a voice.

"Don't move, mudblood. I warned you not to follow me again, you're going to pay for it this time," Draco said coldly. Hermione closed her eyes, her heart thumping in her chest. If Draco took the cloak, she would have to explain where it was to Harry the next time he wanted to use it. If Draco wanted to hurt her here in the Room, nobody would know.

"I'm just browsing the junk, students come here all the time," said Hermione, slowly turning to face him.

"No other students come here except me now," Draco snapped. "You're here because you're spying on me."

"I'm here because you cursed me, and I'm not leaving until you show me the spell you used," said Hermione, looking determined.

"Take out your wand and drop it on the ground," said Draco, pointing his wand at her threateningly.

"Are you going to hurt me?"

"I will if you don't do what I say-"

"Expelliar-!" Hermione started as she drew her wand.

"Stupify!" Draco roared, cutting her off. The Gryffindor girl dodged his stunning spell and slipped behind the cupboard, out of sight.

"Oh, you stupid fucking mudblood," Draco growled, feeling himself surge with anger. "You really picked a bad time to come here."

"I'm not Harry, Malfoy. We don't have to fight, I just want to know what spell you used," Hermione said from her hiding place. She sounded nervous, even panicked, which made Draco smile wickedly. He moved silently into a different position, eyes locked on the cupboard as he attempted to catch sight of her. Hermione kept creeping backward, behind more piles of junk, trying to listen to his footsteps.

"We're going to fight alright, mudblood. It's about time you learned your place," Draco answered, sounding livid. Hermione gasped as she felt surges of rage, rage and uncertainty. Draco heard her gasp and leapt forward.

"Reducto!" he shouted, pointing his wand towards her. She jumped behind a set of drawers which exploded violently, sending shards of wood in every direction. Hermione crawled quickly out of sight into another corridor of junk, gasping in pain. Draco continued sending exploding projectiles in her direction, spiralling into a rage as he destroyed everything in sight to get to her. Hermione felt herself being consumed by Draco's rage, and only just managed to stop herself from standing up to try and duel him. The more anger she felt emanating from Draco, the more terrified she felt herself become. She heard the Slytherin sigh a few paces away from her.

"I feel bad for you, mudblood. I know you're afraid," Draco said slowly, as he continued walking amongst the destroyed junk. "The spell I used had no description, like I said, so it was pointless for you to come here."

Hermione wanted to respond, to say that she didn't care if it didn't have a description, she just wanted to see its written incantation so that she could research it herself. She knew that he was very close however, and if she spoke he would find her. Whilst she was confident in her academic abilities, she knew that she wasn't as gifted in duelling and didn't like her chances against an enraged Malfoy. She heard his footsteps growing ever closer and even if she tried to crawl, he might hear.

"I'm dropping my wand, Malfoy. I'm not fighting you," said Hermione shakily, and she let her wand clatter to the ground as proof. She pulled herself up into a sitting position against a pile of old books, and felt her heart rate increase rapidly as the Slytherin caught sight of her and approached with a wicked smile. Draco used Accio to catch her wand and stood before her, pointing both wands down at her.

"Just because you stopped fighting, doesn't mean I will," he said coldly. "Is that Potter's Invisibility cloak? I've always fancied one of those."

"Please Malfoy, you know something went wrong when you did the curse. It's only gotten worse, I feel everything you feel and it's exhausting," Hermione began to plead, clutching Harry's clock to her chest tightly.

"Shut up and give me the cloak," Draco growled. Hermione shook her head defiantly, and as she did so she felt another stab of rage.

"I don't think you fully understand the situation, Granger. Breakfast is hours away, nobody knows you're here, and I can do things to you that will make you wish you'd die," Draco snarled, his voice laced with hatred and malice. The Gryffindor girl began to visibly shake as he said this, however her grip of the Invisibility cloak didn't slacken. Draco felt an overwhelming amount of fear in that moment, so much fear that he even looked over his shoulder in confusion, thinking someone else was around to get him. He knew that the bookworm was right, he knew the spell had played with their emotions somehow because he was feeling her fear. He didn't like the situation any more than she did, but so far it hadn't caused him any problems and he had more important issues to focus on. The cloak might be just what he needed to kill Dumbledore and live to tell the tale.

"If you take the cloak, Harry will come for you," said Hermione shakily, holding her knees to her chest.

"Good, I want him to try, I'll Sectumsempra him and see how he likes it," Draco spat viciously. At this he felt an enormous tug of guilt, fear and sadness wash over him as Hermione's eyes began to fill with tears.

"You don't have to do this, I know you're under a lot of stress, I-I can help you," Hermione quickly began to say. The prospect of Harry being hurt by Draco because of her tore her up on the inside. Draco laughed coldly at what she'd said, yet her pathetic sadness was beginning to get on his nerves. Ever since she'd walked into the Room, he'd been feeling her emotions more and more.

"You can't help me, nobody can. But that cloak might, and I'm not going to tell you again," said Draco, growing impatient as he tried to ignore her emotions.

"If you hurt me, you'll get expelled. I'll... I'll tell Dumbledore," Hermione vowed weakly.

"Nobody will know if I use the Cruciatus curse, mudblood: it doesn't leave marks. Besides, I hear that old fool you idolise isn't as switched on as he used to be," said Draco with a cruel laugh. "So what'll it be? Crucio or cloak?"

Hermione couldn't believe the situation she'd gotten herself in. She cursed herself for her stupidity and impulsiveness, to come here with Harry's cloak expecting to find anything. The realisation that Draco was literally not going to let her leave with Harry's cloak, and the consequences of this, were eating away at Hermione's conscience. The fact that Draco truly did spend all of his time in the Room, that he appeared unstable and depressed, and that he was willing to risk his Hogwarts education and even time in Azkaban, told Hermione that the boy in front of her was desperate. Desperate and with nothing to lose, to the point of being downright dangerous. If Draco got the cloak he would have the advantage of being invisible anywhere in the castle, the ability to attack Harry however he liked. If Harry was right and Draco was already a Death Eater, then the cloak would open up a world of evil possibilities... at this, Hermione decided that she had only one option. In one swift motion, she flung the cloak around herself and leapt to the right, hoping to escape unseen before Draco could react.

"Crucio!" came the Slytherin's immediate curse, and he knew that it reached his target for two reasons. Firstly, he watched as Hermione writhed on the ground, the cloak only half concealing her body. Secondly, a moment after the curse had landed, he felt excruciating pain all throughout his body: every nerve in his body felt like it was on fire, every section of flesh was being stabbed repeatedly, his brain felt like it was going to explode. He felt himself drop to his knees, which broke the curse and left him numbed. Once he regained his senses and looked up, Hermione had disappeared.

He knew that she was still nearby, because he felt on the verge of tears. The sadness he was feeling was completely foreign, and an almost pleasant emotion compared to the emptiness he was used to. As he got back onto his feet, eyes scanning around himself for a shimmer in the air to identify Hermione with, even the sadness vanished.

\----------

Once Hermione returned to the Gryffindor tower, she went straight up to her room and collapsed in her bed. The others were still sleeping, while Hermione felt like she'd just run a marathon. Every muscle and bone in her body still ached from the Cruciatus curse. She couldn't believe that Draco had actually used the curse on her. The emptiness and dull pain she'd been feeling ever since Draco used the Half-Blood Prince's spell on her, had escalated to an all consuming anguish after she escaped the Room of Requirement. As she curled up in bed and covered herself with blankets, she struggled to hold back tears. Through the anguish all her thoughts revolved around Draco, and she constantly came to the same conclusion. Harry must be right, Draco had to already be a Death Eater if he was capable of using the Cruciatus curse on another student over an Invisibility cloak. If he's a Death Eater, then all of his time spent in the Room of Requirement must be in the service of Voldemort. Therefore whatever he was doing in there and whatever he'd been working on all year, had to be bad news.

As she lay under the covers trying to ignore the ache in her bones, she decided that Dumbledore had to be told about Draco. Telling Dumbledore about the spell that Draco had used on her would be another good idea, given what'd happened. From Hermione's perspective, Draco's Cruciatus curse either rebounded after hitting her, or Draco was feeling the pain that he was inflicting. Since Hermione had been feeling Draco's pain for days, she confirmed the notion that they were in some way, magically linked. At various points, she had already felt Draco's pain, emotions and even seen his owl through his own eyes. Just like Sectumsempra, whatever magic Draco had used from the Half-Blood Prince textbook was extremely dark.

'If this doesn't work, he'll surely kill them. If he hasn't killed them already...'

The words resounded within Hermione's mind clear as day, yet they were entirely foreign. The voice within her mind didn't even sound like her own. Hermione sat upright in bed, straining to listen, however she heard no other strange words. She remembered Harry hearing voices in the walls back in her second year, but that was because he knew Parseltongue. She didn't know Parseltongue, and the voice wasn't coming from the walls, it was coming from her mind. Suddenly she was blinded by tears and overwhelmed with deep, gut-wrenching anguish. Whatever she was experiencing, and whatever she'd heard, had to be coming from Draco. Hermione slipped under the covers once more, wiping her tears away. She resigned herself to a day of being bedridden, given that Draco had her wand and her emotions were a whirlwind. She sighed as she closed her eyes.

\----------

"Draco, I can assist you if you'd just tell me what you're trying to do," said Snape, his voice filled with concern. Whether that concern was genuine or not, Draco didn't know.

"I can't tell you, if I tell you he'll punish my parents," Draco answered, as he paced back and forth.

"He doesn't want to punish them, he just wants the mission to succeed. I can help."

"Of course you want to help, you're always sucking up to him. What, you think you'll come in at the last second and steal all the glory, is that it?" said Draco angrily, glaring at the man who was supposed to be his mentor.

"I've never cared for glory, Draco, don't insult me by implying it," Snape snapped, though he remained calm as he watched the stressed out teen continue pacing. Draco looked like a zombie. His skin was pale and clammy, his hair dishevelled and unkempt, his eyes bloodshot with ugly black bags of exhaustion. The boy ran a hand through his hair, his expression panicked.

"I can't tell you. I can't tell anyone. Even if I told you and you helped, he'll still kill my parents. He said I had to do it myself... I had to redeem the Malfoy name, he said it."

"The Dark Lord says what he needs to say to inspire fear and motivation," Snape drawled, implying that his words shouldn't be taken literally.

"How can you say that? You were there over the holidays, you saw what he did to the others," said Draco in disbelief. His trust in Snape, like everyone else, was fading with each passing day.

"He punished the others for failing their missions," said Snape firmly.

"And my mission is to kill Dumbledore. Me. Not you, no one else but me. If I don't do it, he'll kill my parents. I know it. He said he would. It's not worth the risk," said Draco, his shaking voice thick with fear and panic.

"Draco, Draco, sit down. Just sit down," said Snape in an attempt to calm him down, pointing to the seat in front of his desk.

"I'm not fucking sitting down and I shouldn't even fucking be here, you called me here just to tell me you wanted in? He didn't want you to help me, otherwise he would have fucking asked you to. Every time you call me here to offer your help, you're wasting what little time I have left," Draco snarled, his fists shaking as he glared at the Potions Master.

"You sit here in your comfy fucking office, all calm, as if my parents and my life aren't on the line. You'd happily kill Dumbledore and let my parents die if it got you more respect from him," said Draco accusingly. At this, Snape stood up in a fit of rage.

"I would sooner die to protect you and your parents, Draco. I'm in this office on the Dark Lord's orders. I've sacrificed everything, I've done things you couldn't even imagine," Snape hissed in anger.

"And you'll never tell me any of your secrets, will you?" asked Draco, knowing the answer.

"If I did, he'd kill me for telling you and then kill you for knowing what I've done."

"And if I let you help me, he'll kill my parents. Forget it, I have to do it alone, I have no other choice," said Draco, appearing to have made up his mind. With one last glance at Snape, whose expression conveyed devastation and sadness, Draco left the Potions Master's office. Dinner had finished and darkness had fallen outside the castle, and Draco ignored the chilly air of the dungeons as he made his way all the way up to the seventh floor, to the Room of Requirement. He felt foolish carrying Hermione's wand around with him and he knew that he'd have to return it, or else risk exposure. The idea of trying to blackmail her or offer a trade of her wand for Harry's cloak had crossed his mind. But all it would take is Hermione to run off to Dumbledore, and his entire plan could come crumbling down around him. He cursed himself for allowing her to get away. He cursed himself for using Anima Nexu, the Half-Blood Prince spell on her, which had somehow connected them. Otherwise, he wouldn't have felt her pain and she wouldn't have gotten away. He determined that he would have to give her wand back, but he couldn't allow her to follow him to the Room again. If she discovered the Cabinet, which she eventually would given her admittedly brilliant intellect, his plan would fail and his parents would die. Innocent or not, she had to be stopped, or convinced to stop following him.

\----------

Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please feel free to review and add to your alerts/favourites! :)

**Check out my other stories!**

Draco and Hermione - www.fanfiction.net/s/5661111/1/Draco-and-Hermione

The Soul Connection - www.fanfiction.net/s/9868543/1/The-Soul-Connection

The Time-Turner Division - www.fanfiction.net/s/12337018/1/The-Time-Turner-Division


	5. Chapter 5

Throughout the day, Hermione returned Harry's Invisibility cloak and then spent the rest of her time in bed. She didn't sleep however. Instead, she focused all of her attention and energy on trying to feel what Draco was feeling. In the morning she'd felt anguish after he'd been thinking about someone killing "them". Just after second period, she'd felt intense frustration for a time, and then fear and uncertainty. The majority of the time, she felt nothing but melancholia and a dull, all-consuming emptiness that was worse than anything she'd ever felt before. It was so bad that even as she grew hungry, her motivation to go get food wasn't even there. She was just... existing. Life had seemed to have lost all meaning and purpose.

If this is how he feels... how on Earth is he still functioning? Hermione thought to herself sadly. As night approached she decided that she had no other option than to go to the Room of Requirement and retrieve her wand. She slipped out of the Gryffindor tower thankfully unnoticed, and walked cautiously towards the Room of Requirement, hoping that she wouldn't be seen along the way. She assumed that Draco would be there, given that he seemed to always be there, and her assumption was proven correct.

"Here for your wand?" came his gruff question, as he stood casually beside some junk.

"Not just that. Because of what you did this morning, I want answers," said Hermione firmly as she got closer to where he stood. She glanced around, trying to figure out what he was doing. There appeared to be nothing significant around them though.

"If you're expecting an apology, you're wasting your time," Draco began defensively.

"You should apologise, but that's not why I'm here. Show me Harry's textbook, give me my wand back, and tell me what you're doing in here. Or I'm going straight to Dumbledore," said Hermione, having planned how she would confront him. Yet again, she felt a surge of anger and could immediately recognise it as Draco. She might have laughed at the fact that she was getting good at telling which emotions were his, if it weren't such a serious situation. They stared at each other for a few long moments, Draco's eyes calculating.

"Here's your wand," he said finally, pulling it from his pocket and chucking it to her. "My textbook..."

"Harry's textbook," Hermione corrected in annoyance.

"My textbook," Draco repeated firmly, "is in the Slytherin common room."

This time it was Draco's turn to feel a surge of anger, causing him to smirk. As he smirked, he felt the anger rise. He could differentiate it from his own, however. It was a different kind of anger, more frustrated and annoyed, rather than his own type of aggression.

"Well then, you'd better go and get it."

"I'm not your pet, mudblood. You can't make me go fetch," Draco snarled.

"Then we'll go together, I'm not leaving you alone until I see that damn curse!" Hermione said in determination. There was another lengthy pause, Draco giving her another calculating stare.

"We're not going anywhere together. Wait for me outside the Potions classroom," Draco ordered.

"Do you think I'm stupid? You'll just go into the common room and then stay in there and avoid me," Hermione said.

"I don't give a fuck if you see the spell mudblood, so no, I won't hide in the common room. I intend on coming right back here afterwards, without you," said Draco firmly.

"With me. Malfoy I'm being serious, whatever it is you're doing in here, whatever it is that's making you risk your education, isn't worth it," said Hermione carefully.

"I couldn't care less about my education, or you, mudblood. Stay out of my business after tonight."

"Or what?"

Another long silence. Another calculating stare. Draco felt like he was at his wits end, the girl wasn't budging and he sure as hell couldn't reveal anything about the Cabinets to her...

"What Cabinets?" came Hermione's sudden question. Before she'd even closed her mouth, she felt a surge of panic and saw Draco instinctively draw his wand.

"Expelliarmus!" he screamed, launching Hermione's wand from her hands.

"For goodness sake Malfoy, I'm not a threat to you! Just tell me what you're doing," said Hermione, exasperated.

"You are a threat," Draco snapped.

"How?"

"I can't tell you how... you... it's... for fuck sake Granger!" Draco exploded, looking suddenly panicked, frantic even.

"D-draco calm down," Hermione began.

"You think what I'm doing isn't worth it? My life is on the line, my parents' lives are on the line, I don't have a fucking choice!"

"Whatever it is, I-I can help, Dumbledore can help," Hermione responded quickly.

"You don't get it, mudblood. And you can't get it, because if you do get it, I'll have to kill you. So turn around, go to the Potions classroom and forget everything you've seen and heard and done, do you understand?" said Draco. She ought to be thanking him. He was practically saving her miserable little life by giving her the chance to walk away knowing about the Cabinets. If Voldemort knew that she knew of his plans... he'd have another mission to kill her as well. He'd considered using a memory charm on her to make her forget, but he'd never mastered the spell and if it went wrong, anything could happen. It could backfire like it did for Professor Lockhart. Or it could remove too much of her memory, which could get him expelled, and thus render his mission failed. She was an enormous liability, and he couldn't do anything about it.

"You're going to do something bad, Malfoy, and even if lives are on the line, you can't get away with it. Nobody can get away with meddling with Hogwarts, you'll end up in Azkaban or worse, even if you succeed with whatever it is," Hermione said, ignoring his request for her to leave. She had to find out the truth and stop him, or help him to find another way if she had to. Something she'd said must have had an effect, as Draco's wand arm faltered slightly as he took a deep breath. She felt waves of uncertainty and fear emanate from the boy in front of her.

"I'm willing to go to Azkaban to see it through. I can't tell you what it is. Dumbledore can't help, the Ministry can't, no one can," Draco said flatly.

"I can," Hermione suggested.

"No you fucking can't, mudblood. No. One. Can. I succeed or I die. Me alone. Those are the rules."

"You-Know-Who's rules?" Hermione questioned nervously. Draco raised his wand arm again, narrowing his eyes.

"Shut up," he warned. "Don't say another word. This is too dangerous Granger."

The extreme, raw fear that was exuding from Draco was palpable. Only by feeling his fear could Hermione understand that he was telling the truth. Whatever was going on, really was as dangerous as he claimed. Lives truly were on the line, and likely not just his parents, but others in Hogwarts. Hermione found herself frantically thinking of what she could do about it, as suddenly the curse he'd used on her was the last thing on her mind. She had to tell Dumbledore... only he would know what to do. Only he could protect Hogwarts from whatever it was Draco was doing. He could even protect Draco from himself.

"If you tell Dumbledore, my parents will be dead within a day. I can't let you do that," Draco murmured in resignation. He took a deep breath as if to cast a spell on her.

"Wait! Wait Malfoy, there has to be another way," Hermione pleaded.

"There isn't, and thanks to your prying you've forced my fucking hand mudblood, I told you, I can't let you tell Dumbledore or anyone else!" Draco shouted.

"I won't, I promise," Hermione pleaded again, taking a step back.

"Your promise means nothing to me," Draco snapped, taking a step towards her.

"I-I'll make an Unbreakable Vow," Hermione stammered. The only way he could stop her from telling Dumbledore, would be to kill her or erase her memory. She couldn't risk having him try to erase her memory... for starters, she didn't trust his ability to use the charm accurately, and if she forgot everything she'd learned so far, she would have no chance to stop him. If lives were on the line, she had to at least try to prevent the worst from happening.

"I'm listening," Draco snarled, still pointing his wand at her threateningly.

"I'll make an Unbreakable Vow to not tell anyone about the Cabinets," said Hermione weakly.

"Don't play me for a fool Granger! You won't tell anyone anything about what I'm doing whatsoever, or your memories go bye bye right now."

"That's ridiculous! What if someone asks why you left class early or something?"

"You don't know. Why is Malfoy acting so strange? I don't know. Why is Malfoy in the Room of Requirement? I don't know. Do you think that Malfoy is up to something? I don't know," said Draco, rattling off various scenarios that might prop up. He was silently relieved that Hermione was so smart and had come up with a solution, and was brave enough to actually suggest it. Perhaps her Gryffindor courage wasn't so insufferable after all. They both knew that the punishment for breaking an Unbreakable Vow was death. The Gryffindor girl must have felt his immense relief, because she raised an eyebrow.

"Glad you gave me a chance, huh?"

"I'm giving you a chance to live, mudblood. You're the one who ought to be glad," he answered in annoyance.

"No, Malfoy. If I do this, you're going to tell me everything. If I agree to put my life on the line alongside yours and your parents, I want you to promise me you'll let me help. However I can. I don't want anyone to die, and you're obviously struggling to figure this out on your own," said Hermione.

"Granger, Granger, Granger. The fact that you don't want anyone to die, is the reason I can't tell you everything. No matter how this plays out, people are going to die. On your side, on my side, innocent and guilty alike. Death is coming whether you like it or not," said Draco truthfully.

"Well then I want to help by preventing as much death as possible," said Hermione. Upon realising that she was telling the truth and would actually be willing to make the Vow and learn everything that he was going through, and actually help him, he sighed and lowered his wand. Of course, he knew that she wouldn't actually help him after she learned that his mission was to kill Dumbledore. After she'd made the Vow, however... he smiled maliciously. She'd have no choice but to keep quiet about it.

"What're you smiling about? This isn't funny..." Hermione began angrily.

"No it's not, but it will be when you find out the truth. You still want in? You agree to it now, or your memories are gone," Draco warned.

"I-I'll do it," Hermione stammered.

"A third person needs to conduct the process. I'll get Greg, he won't talk but you can't mention anything while he's here," said Draco firmly.

"Who's Greg?" asked Hermione, perplexed.

"Goyle," said Draco, smirking as she raised her eyes in panic.

"You're going to trust Goyle with conducting an Unbreakable Vow? Isn't it highly advanced magic?" Hermione screeched in outrage.

"It's relatively simple magic, actually. It's only considered advanced because the consequences are death," he responded. "Much like a potion that's simple to make that can cause death, is considered advanced."

"Fine. Fine, but give me my wand back and be quick. I want to get this over with and know the truth, all of the truth," Hermione demanded. Draco raised an eyebrow.

"You didn't think I'd leave you here to your own devices, did you? You could run off to Dumbledore while I'm getting Greg. No... you're going to sit tight like a good little mudblood until my return. Petrificus Totalus!"

\----------

Hermione lay paralysed and utterly furious for about twenty minutes, until she heard the Room's door open. Two pairs of footsteps approached, and she heard chuckling. Her fury reached new heights at this.

Draco was about to playfully tell her to calm down as he felt her rage, but caught himself. Greg didn't know that Draco could feel Hermione's emotions, and Draco had to keep it that way.

"See? She gave me her wand and everything. She'll be angry when she wakes up, but she's begging to be controlled. It must be a mudblood thing, but I'm not complaining," said Draco as arrogantly and cockily as he could muster. After he finished, he felt her confusion and grinned. Of course, he needed some kind of cover story to convince Greg not to tell anyone about it. The cover story was that Hermione was a little bit... submissive. And she perhaps had a thing for the bad boys.

"Damn you weren't lying Draco! Wow man, you got my word, I won't tell anyone," said Goyle in his thick, stupid sounding voice.

"No-one, Greg. You understand? I'd be expelled if this got out, and you would too for making it happen," said Draco, his voice suddenly threatening, malicious, manipulative. It sounded as though he'd rounded on Greg, as Hermione heard their feet shuffling.

"Yeah man, I won't tell anyone. I don't wanna be expelled."

"Good. Alright mudblood, you behave when I let you up," came Draco's arrogant voice again. He silently cast the counter-curse, and watched as Hermione's stiff limbs quickly loosened and she sat bolt upright, her eyes furious.

"A warning would've been nice!" she began as she got to her feet.

"Ah ah, no more talking until the Vow is complete. Let's get this over with quickly, we don't want anyone to come looking for us," said Draco smoothly. Hermione rolled her eyes at how easily he had convinced Goyle to be apart of it, and how gullible the buffoon was to believe that she was... some kind of kinky freak that wanted to be controlled. She silently cursed Draco for coming up with such a gross cover story.

"Get on your knees, mudblood," Draco ordered authoritatively.

"Excuse me? How dare you...!"

"It's part of the Vow, don't get too excited just yet," Draco cut her off sarcastically as he knelt first. Hermione felt herself blush bright red at his words, and then cursed herself for blushing as it probably made her appear like she had been excited. Regardless, after a moment or two of glaring, she knelt in front of him.

"Your right hand," he said simply, holding his own out. She nervously held hers out, and he grabbed it with his own roughly.

"Touch your wand to our joined hands, and do not move it away until I say so, okay Greg?" Draco said seriously, looking up at the other Slytherin, who nodded and did as he was told. Hermione felt her heart rate start beating faster, and was suddenly aware of the gravity of what she was about to do. Her nervousness and fear must have been obvious, because she felt a hard squeeze on her right arm and looked up at Draco, who gave her a curt nod. It was only a nod, but it felt genuine and she was somewhat more at ease. A moment later and Greg had touched his wand to their joined hands, and a bright thin flame emanated from the wand. All three of them watched in awe as it slowly slithered around their joined hands, as if binding them together.

"Now. Will you, Hermione, keep all of my secrets and not tell anyone anything that I am or have been doing, until my mission is complete?"

There was a pause as Hermione analysed exactly what his statement entailed.

"I will."

At this, a thicker flame burst from the wand and wrapped around their arms, tightening and binding them together.

"Will you assist me in my mission, to the best of your ability, if I ask you to?" Draco said next, testing the waters. He was curious to see how far she would go. She may not realise it, but if she agreed to this, he would suddenly have considerable power over her. He added the, 'if I ask you to' at the end as a courtesy. If he'd left it as is, and she got lazy or didn't actually try to help at all times, the Vow would probably kill her. At least this way he could control what he could ask her do. And given that the Cabinets may require some Transfiguration expertise, he figured it was worth a shot to get her to Vow to help. He felt as though she'd heard or understood some of what he was thinking, because her eyes narrowed as she glared at him and a lengthy silence ensued. The binding flames didn't seem to care how long she took.

"I will."

At this, another flame burst from the wand and encircled their arms and the other flames, binding them together as Draco smiled. Hermione grimaced.

"That's it, Greg. Remove the wand and don't tell anyone about this, understand?" said Draco seriously. Goyle did as he was told, and as the wand was pulled away, all of the flames vanished with a gentle puff. Hermione tugged her arm out of Draco's grip. As Goyle nodded and hurried from the Room of Requirement, seemingly spooked by the magic he'd just helped create, Hermione rubbed her wrist as she could still feel a strange tingling. Neither of them had moved from their kneeling positions, and when she looked up into his eyes, he spoke.

"So. Are you ready for the truth?"

\----------

Thank you for reading! If you liked this chapter, please feel free to review and add to your alerts/favourites! :)

**Check out my other stories!**

Draco and Hermione - www.fanfiction.net/s/5661111/1/Draco-and-Hermione

The Soul Connection - www.fanfiction.net/s/9868543/1/The-Soul-Connection

The Time-Turner Division - www.fanfiction.net/s/12337018/1/The-Time-Turner-Division


End file.
